The NFR Project: 'The Black Pirate'

 

The Black Pirate

Dir: Albert Parker

Scr: Jack Cunningham

Pho: Henry Sharp, Arthur Bell, George Cave

Ed: Bret Hampton, William Nolan

Premiere: March 8, 1926

94 min.

Douglas Fairbanks (Sr.) was the first king of Hollywood. Starting out as a light comedian, he made a name for himself with his short but peppy, fast-moving dramedies, spiked with daring stunts. Eventually, he hit upon the perfect formula for him to celebrate his values of energy and optimism. Swashbuckling epics, starting with The Mark of Zorro in 1920 (see my review here) and including The Thief of Bagdad (see my review here), were his claim to fame.

The Black Pirate originated, supposedly, from a conversation Fairbanks had with a young Jackie Coogan, who expressed his affection for Howard Pyle’s 1921 Book of Pirates. Leafing through the book, Fairbanks was captivated by the illustrations and insisted on creating a pirate project himself. He supplied the film’s story, using the pseudonym of “Elton Thomas” (his middle names).

The film is shaped around the persona of its star, and is composed of all the standards elements of a Fairbanks action/adventure – stirring fight sequences, lavish detail and miniature work, a bit of (chaste) romance, a soupcon of comedy, and just the documentation of the kinetic energy generated by the whirlwind Fairbanks.

Additionally, the film had the distinction of being the first successful color feature film. It seems that Technicolor had been developed to the extent of being cost-effective. It was still crude, recording only reds and greens in a “two-strip” format. Lacking the blues and yellows of the spectrum, the result is a vaguely colored-in, dusky, burnished, Old Masterish kind of look that was surely impressive 100 years ago.

The story is a classic one. A young man (Fairbanks) and his dying father are stranded by pirates. The son swears revenge. Neatly, he comes upon the pirates and fights their chief, killing him and winning the crew’s allegiance. He cows his naysayers by next capturing a ship single-handled, with he does with grace and aplomb.

When a woman is discovered on the attacked ship, our hero adroitly keeps the others from molesting her as he fights for time and a chance to free her. Unfortunately, his plan is discovered and he is forced to walk the plank! Beyond this I will not go, but gentle viewer, feel sure that by film’s fade-out, justice and virtue triumph.

Actor/director Donald Crisp was slated to direct this film, but is supposed to have been in conflict early on with Fairbanks and taken off the directing job. If there was a conflict, it must have resolved itself, as here Crisp plays the prominent role of the hero’s one-armed sidekick MacTavish. Visible here too, in the last frames of the film, are Fairbanks’ real-life wife, Mary Pickford, dressed up like actress Billie Dove to take the closing smooch from her husband. Such were the mores of Hollywood at the time.

The Black Pirate is really the last of Fairbanks’s great swashbucklers. He would take a much more adult tone in his 1927 The Gaucho, and after that the talkies came along. Fairbanks was no longer young, and his brand of brash, go-go, idealistic Americanism was going out of style. He would die in 1939, at the young age of 56.

The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: Ella Cinders.

The NFR Project: 'The Flying Ace' (1926)

 

The Flying Ace

Dir: Richard E. Norman

Scr: Richard E. Norman

Pho: Unknown

Ed: Unknown

Premiere: 1926

65 min.

In the early 20^th century (not to mention today), Black people could not catch a break – neither legally, socially, nor culturally. Racial prejudice was the norm. The Jim Crow laws, which kept American society essentially segregated, were in full effect. On the mainstream stage and screen, Black people were portrayed as foolish, mentally challenged, or dangerous. Black artists played the “Chitlin’ Circuit” of Black-only nightclubs and theaters, under the control of the Theatre Owners Booking Association (also known as TOBA – Tough on Black Asses).

There were exceptions, such as the great Black independent filmmaker Oscar Micheaux. He and others made what were then called “race” films – movies intended solely for Black audiences. In Black movie houses, the same range of films played – adventures, romance, drama, even Westerns – but they were enacted and shot by Black artists.

Such was the case with the Norman Studios of Jacksonville, Florida. This white-owned film company made “race” films, and owner Richard Norman was dedicated to improving race relations, as well as making a profit. Norman wrote and directed the film, and a question develops – how truly can a white creator capture a Black experience?

But there is no evidence given of a colloquial Black culture that requires special representation and understanding. This film would play the same whether it was inhabited by Black or white actors – the script is strictly color-blind. The resulting effect is that we see a movie completely devoid of racial stereotyping, as it contains not a single white character. Simply put, there is no one there whose self-esteem needs bolstering by degrading someone of a different color.

The story revolves around a stolen railroad payroll, and the efforts of a resolute detective (formerly a WWI flyer, therefore the movie’s title) to recover it, as well as win the affections of the film’s heroine. The usual machinations take place, ending with the baddie kidnapping the girl and flying away with her, prompting the hero to chase and effect a death-defying mid-air rescue.

Such imaginative folderol was a staple of the films of the time. The big difference here is that, with this film, Black audiences got to experience a modicum of cultural respect.

 The NFR is one writer’s attempt to review all the films listed in the National Film Registry in chronological order. Next time: The Black Pirate.

 

 

'The Flash': Much ado about what was that again?

 

The Flash

Dir: Andy Muschietti

Scr: Christina Hodson

Pho: Henry Braham

Ed: Jason Ballantine, Paul Machliss

Premiere: June 16, 2023

144 min.

Everyone would like to go back and fix the past. That’s just what Barry Allen (the reputationally beleaguered Ezra Miller) does in his first and presumably his last stand-alone feature as the speedy superhero in The Flash.

It’s also something that’s occurred in the DC superhero-movie universe, time and time again – a second-guessing, a reconsideration of the final product through expanded “Ultimate Edition”s and directors’ cuts in an attempt to please fans, and gain additional revenue on the way.

The Flash is the next-to-last entry in the now-abandoned DC Extended Universe model of interrelated films (coming up later this year: Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom), which commenced with Man of Steel in 2013, and is popularly referred to as “the Snyderverse,” after director/producer Zach Snyder, whose vision had led the way with entries such as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League. Now James Gunn, director of the successful Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy for Marvel, and DC’s funny, gory The Suicide Squad, is in charge of things at DC studios and is planning a new series of films even as we speak.

But enough exposition. How’s the film? It’s fairly entertaining, though as is the case with many DC films, it is too long and the CGI has its weak moments. That’s too bad, because this movie really leans on incorporating (spoiler alert!) all manner of alternate time-line Batmans and Supermans into the climax, unleashing a torrent of visual effects that feels like someone trying to push all the keys and pedals of a massive pipe organ.

In the film, the Flash discovers that he can run so fast that he can travel through time (stay with me). His father is imprisoned for his mother’s death, and he wants to go back in time and prevent her murder, or at least exonerate his dad. He succeeds, but in doing so changes reality, past and present, and leaves the Earth open to destruction. He must quickly (of course) round up his own version of the Justice League to try to deal with General Zod, Superman’s Kryptonian opponent on Man of Steel, who was killed trying to conquer Earth in that film.

The movie lives or dies on the effectiveness of its central character, and Ezra Miller does a decent job in his role as the Scarlet Speedster. He handles goofy and confused quite well, but has his problems with darker emotions such as anger and sadness (beware: there is copious weeping in this movie). His work is interesting, but ultimately too lightweight for the more serious underpinnings of the story.

Ben Affleck is back at Batman. But wait! Other Batmans lurk here too, and Michael Keaton kinds of dials it in as alternative-timeline Caped Crusader, one that’s retired into a life of eccentric reclusiveness. Will Flash shake him out of his stupor? What do you think?

Michael Shannon reemerges as Zod, and is given little to do save look menacing and make pronouncements. Jeremy Irons is there in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it as Alfred, Bruce Wayne’s faithful servant.

In the end, The Flash is a moderately interesting superhero flick, a standard-gauge genre film that fills in all the blanks in the schematic of how a superhero movie is made. It tries to have fun but bogs down in its self-indulgent conclusion. For those of us who love or study superhero films, there are more questions. Will DC ever stop messing up and redoing their increasingly unsuccessful releases? Can James Gunn right the ship? Will the audience put up with it?